Opinion

  In human services, the idea of bridging research and practice is, if I may quote a classic piece of art house cinema, “so hot right now.” With advocates ranging from venerable, traditionally academic corners like the Center for the Study of Social Policy to the more pop-culturally-named Moneyball for Government, efforts to bring data […]

  I started my social impact career at the age of 21, and for 7 years I worked on the frontlines as a mental health clinician, substance abuse counselor, and case manager for the homeless. While serving as a case manager, I had a transformational moment. I was invited to a community meeting where the […]

  We need more data talent in the nonprofit sector. Data has the power to revolutionize our organizations yet we lack the workforce to launch the revolution. So where should this workforce come from?   There are two strategies we can employ to increase the data talent in the sector; attract or develop.   Many […]

  At the October 2013 World Bank annual meetings bank president Jim Kim committed to an extraordinary vision of collecting beneficiary feedback for 100 percent of projects with clearly identified beneficiaries. The World Bank locates beneficiary feedback as a subset within the larger theme of citizen engagement. Other elements of citizen engagement have been part of […]

  To dramatically expand opportunity and improve the lives of young people, their families and communities, government policy and funding decisions must be informed by the best possible data and evidence about impact. In short, government at all levels must be committed to “investing in what works.” To make this case, in 2013, Results for […]

  Last month, I had the pleasure of attending the Social Innovation Summit, a twice-annual event that represents a global convening of thought leaders in technology, investment, philanthropy, international development, and business. I’ve been going every year since 2009 to cover the event on my blog. Out of all the amazing speakers and discussions, I was lucky enough […]

In November, I facilitated a mini-innovation lab on measuring impact for grantees of the Google Nonprofit program at the Impact Hub. The hot button issue was capacity, skills, and lack of resources. It was articulated as: “We don’t have the skills to analyze, slice and dice, and make sense of our data, so it is hard to […]

Giving more data won’t make us wiser and sacrificing more for data’s sake won’t make us safer. What can the social sector learn from the tragedy of Harvey Dent?

Last week I published The Death of Program Evaluation, highlighting my firm belief that evaluation as it is today needs to change and evolve. Program evaluation is often not forward looking, over-focused on statistical proof, and actually undermines program improvement. The post sparked a debate across twitter, the website, and the Markets for Good community […]

Is program evaluation dying? This question has been swirling around my head the last few months. I don’t mean to imply that programs should stop evaluating their outcomes. I just find that the current framework of traditional, social science driven program evaluation is frankly not embracing the possibilities of today’s world. Put simply, program evaluation […]